Spyros

And finally that's enough of woodworking, time to cut some leather and make some stuff I needed for the shed First I needed some storage solution for my sharpening kit. The main challenge here was to keep the stones from banging against eachother, so I needed a box with some sort of pockets. This is what I came up with: and this is the finished tool box: I like it, it looks like an old school first aid kit or something The funny thing is, of all the bags I made, which one did my wife want the most? My sharpening kit tool box of course! "Oh wow, a square bag! Can I have it???" LOL

Then I made some bins to the left and right of the HDPE, for my most used items that I wanted close to hand. just straight up screwed some timber borders on the bench, it does the trick to keep things from rolling around. and then I made proper storage solution for my countless hand press bits This is where you will find me half the time holding a spring snap in one hand and looking at those bits trying to figure out WTF I'm supposed to use LOL

Then a ramp to roll the bandsaw out quickly when I want to use it. No cutting and sawdust anywhere near my leather! That took a bit of cutting with the angle grinder, which I hate, too noisy. I just cut a few pieces of angle iron for the frame and mounted them on the concrete with dynabolts, this is a photo from underneath the ramp: Not going anywhere.

Still looking for a good stone, but I did make some final adjustments to the shed. First some storage for my leather. I just cut 3 freestanding pieces of marine plywood and a couple of cross-beams to keep it all together, then screwed it on the studs. Simple but it does the job and keeps the leather out of the way.

yeah but with your $500 of equipment you can make 5 wallets and earn all your money back really quickly. Not sure if you can do that with scrapbooking* but you can't with any other craft I can think of... I guess you could buy a drill, a circular saw and a sander and start building timber decks, that's pretty much all you need. Plus 10 years experience of course, by which time you would have accumulated $10k worth of tools anyway *to be honest I'm not sure what scrapbooking is, I googled some images and left me confused LOL Kids diaries?

Try woodworking or metalworking... $1k doesn't even get you decent dust extraction, never mind that you have to sacrifice the best part of 2 car garage to get anywhere near a usable workspace. I always thought leather working is incredibly cheap! it still blows my mind that I can make something substantial that people actually desire, using nothing but a desk and a couple of drawers worth of tools

I know why, because you didn't read my post right before Chuck"s

I thought the collaboration on youtube between Weaver and Corter was a good idea and must be working well for them. Weaver (Chuck?) is loading a whole bunch of instructive videos (they're infomercials really but still, you can learn stuff from them) and Corter has a natural way of making things looking simple and achieving nice results. I like them both and used to watch them, and I remember coming out feeling like I wanted to make something. That's the whole point innit? I agree the mystique of advanced leatherworking is intimidating and ultimately off putting for beginners. But it was never meant for beginners anyway. Another guy on youtube, probably my favourite, who I think is doing the craft a great service with his relaxed and polite manners and his simple and logical approach to everything is Harry Rogers. Look him up, it's a pleasure just to hear him talk. We need more like him I think.

I love Frodo's inventiveness I have a woodworking lathe of sorts (another DIY job) and I have turned soft metals on it like brass for small jobs like ferrules for tool handles etc. Hardened steel of course is a whole different league, but if we're just talking about shaping the outside of a cylinder to a dimension without super precise accuracy, it's something you can do by mounting on a drill (ideally drill press) and a file. And a lot of patience

Derrr, I mean Chicago not Philips obviously LOL

Welcome to my world, I hardly ever remember the hardware until it's too late LOL I've become an expert on after the fact operations like punching holes in the air (drilling is a great alternative) and shoving various hard items of different shapes inside projects to be able to push a rivet in and somehow punch it to lock. Also removing misplaced saddle rivets is kind of a specialty of mine. Lotsa fun In your case I'd drill the holes instead of punching them and then I'd use Philips screws instead of rivets (don't forget the loctite).

By the way if a steel tool breaks when dropped it doesn't mean it's poor quality, it means it has been heat treated for maximum hardness and to hold an edge, which usually means it will be brittle. Drop a high end metal file on a concrete floor a couple of times, it will break. Bevellers are not meant to be used with force anyway.

I'm really happy with my Kemovan craft ones (ver 3) Having said that I haven't tried the ones you mentioned so I'm only comparing with the Wuta leather ones I had previously (and they are night and day)

That's really good, well done! I love it when people find solutions like that Personally my biggest problem with my setters (I have like 50 of them, all cheapies) is figuring out when to use each one of them, cheap setters means no instructions But I did sth similar with hole punches, I bought a whole bunch of cheap ones from the hardware store (I think I paid sth like $15 for 2 sets of 5) and shaped them and sharpened them to leather working standards. 6 months in they're still going strong, no complaints, turns out even though cheap it was actually proper tool steel and well treated. Unfortunately I don't have a metal lathe or machine shop around so I did all the shaping on the belt sander with just a basic jig, then did the sharpening on the drill press. Not easy, and I did destroy the first few I tried, but I got the hang of it eventually and ended up with 6 usable ones in all the basic sizes. When working with belt sanders the key is to keep dunking your work piece in water to keep it cool so you don't anneal/soften the steel. The other thing I did I bought a box of cheap assorted cutters in all shapes, for those times when you just don't have the exact shape/size punch in your arsenal. Now those things are very basic and thin, not heavy duty at all, but they do cut like razors. So I found the one I was using the most, cut a slot with a dremel on a steel bar and then a hole with a drill, and made it into a tool with a handle. Took about 10 mins. Like I said not heavy duty at all, but on light leather it does the job very well, it cost basically nothing and I've been using it every day for months now. Just have to remember not to smack it too hard, it's not a normal punch. Again you have to be careful not to destroy or deform the cutting bit when drilling the hole, that was the most challenging part. Needs a sharp drill bit, spraying with WD40, and some sort of soft support like a piece of wood.

Maybe then try your normal process on an offcut and see if that covers the odour. Or try something neutral like saddle soap.

I find my usual oil dye then carnauba cream then resolene covers any odours.

Pay an accountant for half an hour to walk you through the basics in sales tax and registering a business. It's different from place to place. Don't price your items to make a profit, price them to what they're selling for. Then figure out if you're actually making a profit at those prices and that will tell you if you want to really invest in business.

Love it, big fan of the English tan with black edges Brass hardware might also look great

Frodo, maybe stick to leatherworking.

Same LOL

Frodo, he's talking about the machine for belts ($1,800) Not the handheld tool

Yeah I just painted it, and yep it was a photo opp There was caked sawdust everywhere... the only way to clean was to take everything outside (incl the benches) which was a massive job, and I figured if I'm gonna do all that I may as well give it a coat of paint.

Thanks guys No, you're absolutely right, it's just that I haven't found a good one yet. We're still in lockdown over here so I can't visit the usual places to check out their offcuts.

The box is where I keep my most used items, KS blades, maul, box cutter etc The other containers up top are mainly for sandpaper and canvas To the right is a rotary tool for polishing, electric creasing tool, brushes for glue, bulldog clips, press Boba Fett in the corner needs to get airbrushed at some point the tambour box is just for random other stuff And the drawers on the left are mostly hardware. Amazing how quickly hardware builds up Aaaand that's it pretty much I haven't actually done any leatherworking in here yet, I just finished it today. I hope it works well

These are the basic essentials. I'm a big fan of magnets The main surface is 12mm HDPE screwed on the bench. I haven't tried HDPE before, see how it goes. The floor is all epoxy so if anything spills it's easy to clean up I made the chair myself, it turns into a ladder if I want to reach something up top The main drawer is just for off cuts, cloths, towels etc To the left is my Flintstones tablet holder. I made it as a joke because the tablet is over 10 years old, but it's so practical that I've never stopped using it